Collections : [Rare Book & Manuscript Library]

Correspondence, documents, photographs, tape recordings of interviews with people who knew John Berryman, and printed material gathered by John Haffenden for the authorized biography of Berryman, commissioned by Faber and Faber. Haffenden is a lecturer in English at the University of Sheffield.

Correspondence and manuscripts of Van Doren, consisting of letters, poems, short stories, novels, plays, radio broadcast transcripts ("Invitation to Learning"), diaries, critical works, proofs, and printed works. Correspondents include Louise Bogan, Philip Booth, Babette Deutsch, Richard Eberhart, T.S. Eliot, John Gould Fletcher, Herbert Gorman, E.W. Howe, Robinson Jeffers, Archibald MacLeish, Louis MacNeice, Edgar Lee Masters, Lewis Mumford, Hyam Plutzik, Allen Tate, and Louis Zukovsky. Also, extensive correspondence with Robert Lax and Thomas Merton, as well as manuscripts by these two authors.

Correspondence, manuscripts, and proofs of writings by and about John Berryman collected by his friend and critic, William Meredith. The collection also contains 28 volumes from Berryman's library containing his notes, inscriptions, etc. (loose notes are filed with the manuscripts) and 43 books, mostly inscribed to Berryman's mother. Correspondence of the following people are cataloged: Van Meter Ames, Saul Bellow, John Berryman, Robert Giroux, William Meredith, and William Phillips.